When this blog first started, in 2004, it was entirely dedicated to independent travellers.

“For people moving in liberty. For those curious and open to cultural differences ready to meet others without any prejudices. For those willing to integrate into the various social contexts they may meet while travelling around the world. For those who think a trip is not just a geographic, but a human journey, made of changes inevitably occurring when the own four walls are left with an explorer-mood”.

That’s what I used to write in 2004 and that is pretty much how I still feel about travelling.

It’s not about the place itself, not about historical or architectural details, museum times, transport information, good restaurants or places to stay – you can Google or Tripadvisor those ones. Much more it’s about the adventures and emotions, the atmospheres and lucky coincidences you can experience, the incredible situations and people you can find in the world, if only you are open and flexible enough.

Nothing is set in stone for how I like to travel, it’s rather a moving – and here I go quoting myself again - “in accordance to circumstances and contacts, like the dynamic passivity of certain oriental philosophies. The flow of events often leading to be in the right place at the right time: like a river transporting you without too much planning”.

And also

“Not a simple log-book of personal experiences, or anyway only to a certain extent, but a series of short articles and pictures on topics met along the way. Hence, besides travel-reports, you can even find political, economic and social topics, as well as cultural, art and sport-events”.

In those times I was travelling solo or with friends to some fantastic places: Polynesia, Indonesia, Caribbean, Russia-Siberia-Mongolia-China on the Trans-Siberian Railroad, but also road trips in Europe (Romania, Hungary, Cech Republic, etc.). My stories used to be published on our local daily “Il Gofo”, where I used to run a personal travel column called “Storie da altri mondi” (Stories from other worlds). I may recover some of those old stories, although time has past, some may still be interesting.

A lot has changed since: I have been at sea for many years, I have now a partner and a child, who thank goodness love travelling as much as I do.

When you work on mega-yachts you get to see and live in – sometimes even for longer periods – in some amazing locations. On my holidays and on my days off I’ve always shot off for some cool expeditions, and I collected lots of pictures and stories I would like to share with you.

But I also would like to tell you about my new small or big family trips. Being an international couple we’re frequently On The Road, even if it is just to see relatives or go to work. I am now forced to do a little planning ahead, due to my baby, but I still move pretty much like before.

That said, I have to underline: www.inthesun.it is not a tour operator, I’m not organizing holidays or trips, my wish is rather “to tell you stories using the journey as a pretext”.

To be perfectly honest, I was seriously in doubt if to start blogging again. This web-site (www.inthesun.it) first saw light in 2004, but due to many circumstances, it has been abandoned for quite some time. My web-hosting provider’s phone call last year give me the wake up call: “We didn’t hear anything of you for so long, we were starting to get concerned. So, are you planning to keep the domain and the site going or are you giving it up?” Oh! Good question. It forced me to look back. So much time and effort and also dreams and hopes at that time, I couldn’t pretend I didn’t care. In it’s Hay-day it was even a kind of popular in Italy, my “independent travellers’ blog”. Many friendships and even job opportunities have started with it. No, I couldn’t just shut the door on it and pretend it never happened. Secretly I’ve always been thinking I would give it another go, but never actually got around to it: I carried on collecting pictures and stories to tell, so that “one day” I would put them on my blog. That one-day was there now, and I didn’t know if I was ready. Times have changed, I have changed, and I am maybe a little more realistic about my projects. But if you read this lines, something must have triggered my will to put myself out there again and accept the challenge. I decided it was time to give www.inthesun.it a face-lift, a total body-scrub, a fresh hair-do and a brand new outfit.

This what my old logo looked like.

Three more events have given me the final push:

I was loosely reading a about blogging in this era, and I came across one sentence that rang like a bell in my ears: “If you care enough to blog, it means that you’ve got something to say” (Mitch Joel of Twist Image, Six Pixels of separation, in his article “How to start blogging in 2012″). Yes, I did care enough. So many stories to tell about my travels, my projects, my hobbies, maybe someone out there could find them interesting. Otherwise I could have not explained this urge to “share and connect” as Joel writes, or as I would say “to communicate“.

The second reason, had to do with job: after becoming a mum it was about time to start working properly again, possibly with some personal entrepreneurial projects giving me a chance to work on an island where the current economic crisis doesn’t offer many opportunities. My career in the yachting-industry was a kind of on hold, except for some temping, so I came up with a cunning plan. Why not using my skills, my know-how and my experience in the industry to start a shore-based yachting-assistance business on the island? I needed a way to advertise my idea, though…

The final push came from a mum-to-mum chat in a playgroup in the UK, while I was visiting my in-laws: “Oh, you are Italian” she said. “So you can cook”. Cliché, but yes I can. And she carried on: “But you are so skinny, I’m sure you’re not eating that much pasta”. “It only depends on what you do to that pasta”, I hissed a little defensively. “Well, I go to the supermarket, buy a sauce, boil the pasta, pour the sauce on top of it”. “What a shame” I said, “by the time you boiled your pasta, you could have prepared you own sauce”. Her reply caught me by surprise: “Really? It would be so cool if you could teach us”. I have to say, I never even considered that option, but truth is that a lot of people can’t actually cook. About 40% of Brits don’t know how to cook more than 7 meals – I was reading one day on the Daily Mail – “causing nutritional values possibly to be unbalanced”. To be fair, I believe also many Italians don’t know how to cook, and the number of people reaching into the supermarket freezer for ready-meals is increasing. So even sharing my simple Italian and non-Italian recipes could be of interest for someone. Amazingly enough the recipe part has been the most successful part of my previous blog, together with my Trans-Siberian railroad trip.

The key-elements were all there. Now I only had to put them on paper (or file) and get the ball rolling.

A blog about a little Anglo/Italian/German family with one foot on an island in the Med and one foot in yachting, with a home to fix, an urban garden to build, lots of stories to tell and recipes to share.